'King Lear' meets opera & Alzheimers

World premiere of cutting-edge new opera set for next week at UC San Diego is latest from award-winning composer Anthony Davis

Award-winning composer Anthony Davis, a longtime professor at UC San Diego, will present the world premiere of his new, "King Lear"-inspired opera next week. Performances will be held at the La Jolla campus March 6, 8 and 9. Photo by NELVIN C. CEPEDA/ San Diego Union-Tribune, ZUMA Press
— Nelvin C. Cepeda

Award-winning composer Anthony Davis, a longtime professor at UC San Diego, will present the world premiere of his new, "King Lear"-inspired opera next week. Performances will be held at the La Jolla campus March 6, 8 and 9. Photo by NELVIN C. CEPEDA/ San Diego Union-Tribune, ZUMA Press
— Nelvin C. Cepeda

“Doing this, I did think about Ellington a lot, and (Charles) Mingus — who are both always influences in my music,” Davis said. “And I did think somewhat about ‘Thunder,’ but put it in a more dramatic form, not just a suite. It’s interesting, because there are no real operas of ‘Lear’ — it’s too huge a story — (although) Verdi tried to do it. But we’re not really doing ‘Lear’ as much as we’re riffing on ‘Lear’ as a back-up to our story, which is about a woman wrestling with dementia and her three daughters, and her unresolved relation with her dead husband, Mortimer, who only she can see and communicate with.”

If that sounds like heavy going, it is.

But Davis, who also draws from reggae music in parts of “Lear,” is quick to stress he doesn’t regard this re-invention as a tragedy.

“It’s a tragic-comedy,” he said. “The comedy is coming from the language and kind of storytelling. If you’re so earnest and tell a sad story about someone facing Alzheimer’s, it’s less interesting than if you put in some quirky things. For me, it’s fun to find the comic element in even the worst situation.”

Lear on the 2nd Floor,” a world premiere opera by Anthony Davis and Allan Havis

Anthony Davis composed the music for Tony Kushner's Tony Award-winning production of "Angels in America." Davis did not win a separate Tony Award, as the original version of this article incorrectly indicated.